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#heweb11 Recap

Driving out of Austin, TX

I finally have a minute to talk about #heweb11.

If you’ll remember my post last year about #heweb10, I wasn’t entirely happy with the quality of the sessions. This year was a big improvement – even if my presentation proposal was denied. The content was certainly better, I think what might have helped was that I went in not expecting much from the sessions, but expecting everything from connecting with people throughout the conference.

And really, that’s the crux of working in Higher Ed. The people are amazing.

Playing at the High Ball

Top 10 things about #heweb11 (in no particular order):

  1. Roadtrippin’ it with @aaronrester
  2. Roomdawgin’ it with @sethodell
  3. Banjo Pickin’ at The High Ball in Austin
  4. Being the CTO of Dropbox for 25 minutes
  5. Eating lots of Mexican food
  6. Salt Lick with @kylejudah and @mpstaton
  7. Networking, networking, networking
  8. Bacon & Marv behind Buffalo Billiards
  9. Seeing sessions from @sethodell, @mikepetroff, @kprentiss, & @mallorywood
  10. Learning and discussing higher ed with so many great people in the lobby of the Hyatt.

Thanks for a great conference everyone!

Day at The Getty

Walking up levels at The Getty.

After flying into ONT, we spent the day at The Getty with Jessica and my parents. I love The Getty. It’s my favourite museum in the US. The architecture alone is worth visiting, but they also have great revolving exhibits and a pretty impressive permanent collection.

Of note was the Walker Evans exhibit of his Cuba photos. SO good.

If you’ve never been to The Getty, you really should. The grounds are amazing.

See my photos on the full post.

On My Way to Victorville…

Row of colorful fabric in Los Angeles

…where I know someone who knows it there - @limbeck

Well, Apple Valley, which is right next to Victorville. Early Wednesday morning Jessica and I will be boarding a Southwest flight at MKE and winging our way to the west coast, arriving in Ontario and able to spend the whole day basking the sweet glow of the Golden State. My baby sister is graduating from high school on Friday, making this a perfect time for us to stop by my home state.

In Desperate Need…

…of a break. I have been going almost non-stop for a few months. We had a nice break over Thanksgiving with my mom and sister visiting us. I got nothing done that I needed to and then all of that came crashing down on me once they left. But it was worth it to gain back my sanity and to enjoy my family’s presence.

Freelance kind of jumped off a cliff and went soaring this month. I’m working on two projects for Department Three clients and one for the wife of our university president. And that’s fine. Except for having finals and school and all that stuff. Luckily, my large, intensive final is finished.

So I can focus on coding these last two sites and wrapping up my classes before we take off next week for West Virginia and our long Christmas break.

Prior to Christmas, Jessica and I are going to Williamsburg, VA for our fifth wedding anniversary. It’s be five years. Amazing. Doesn’t seem like it’s been that long while at the same time seeming longer. We’re going to have a nice 3 day weekend away from responsibility just to enjoy a massage, history, great food, relaxation, and each other’s company.

In any case, I plan on returning to work on 3rd January re-energized and ready to dive into a CMS migration project.

back from #heweb10

HighEdWeb

photo by HighEdWeb on Flickr

Wow. What a week. I got back from the HighEdWeb conference on Wednesday night. It was a blast. Great group of people–amazing to see some old friends and to finally meet a few newer ones face to face.

I wrote up a post over A Not-So-Commonplace Book about my thoughts, and I’m not going to reiterate any of that here. Except there’s one point I want to emphasize. The #heweb community is fantastic. When I finally make the leap out of HighEdWeb and into academia or graphic design or something else, these people are what I am going to miss the most.

Some strange stories, a lot of fun, and some thought inducing lectures. Excited for where I am taking the next year.

So, so glad I got to hang out with people like @billyadams, @KarlynM, @mikepetroff, @lougan, @MalloryWood, @lanejoplin, @kylejames, @fienen, @NikkiMK, @nickdenardis, @radiofreegeorgy, etc., etc., etc. Hope to see you all soon.

That Travel Itch

Aer Lingus Jetliner at Dublin Airport

It’s been almost exactly two years since we’ve been out of the country. I have that itch…

Actually, Jessica and I have been talking about some future plans. What are we going to do with after I finish my MA, what do we ultimately want to do with ourselves work-wise? I know that I do not have a corporate bone in my body. Higher Ed is good because there’s a structured environment, but also because it’s a little more relaxed. I remember when I was seriously considering a move to freelance web if a new permanent job didn’t come up. The saddest part was not being a part of the HigherEdWeb community anymore.

Neglect This Blog Much?

Yeah, I must.

Geez. What’s wrong with me? I guess part of it is that I’ve been working on my academic site, A Not-So-Commonplace Book. Part of it is that I’ve been taking a break during my 3-week summer break. And part is that I’ve been busy with jobs for Department 3. Which has been awesome.

So, this week the Summer term at The New School started up. We made a trip to Rochester, NY as well to see our great friends Micah and Stephanie get married. It was a fun time filled with food, record shopping, driving, beer, baseball, bonfires… oh and Niagara Falls!

So now I’m back to the grind of school. I’m really excited about my classes too. I’m taking Aesthetics of Interactive Design with Jörg Müller and Micro Narratives with Philip Kain. It’s going to be a great summer.

Looking forward to rolling out my new and improved site once WP 3.0 is released a few weeks.

Us at Niagara FallsMore photos in my Flickr photostream!

Holidays Are Here Again

Jessica and I had a fantastic Thanksgiving, and I hope yours was great too. Once again we made the trek out to Hurricane, West Virginia to spend the holiday with her parents. Jess’ grandma was able to be with us too for T-day and an early Christmas.

In three weeks we’ll be flying out to California for a West coast Christmas tour. My parents house is first, then we’ll drive up to Portland, Oregon with them just before the new year. My sister’s wedding is the first week of January, in Portland, and after that we’ll be heading home.

So, busy busy times ahead.

We’re also thinking about having a small Christmas dinner party with some friends. The school I work at gave the faculty and staff a turkey for Christmas. Well, with us leaving for the holiday, we’re going to have a turkey to get rid of and we certainly can’t do it on our own.

I am so ready for a break. I need to regain some mental health, I think. And I also have some designs to work on and some new projects to get started.

Hope you’re having a great holiday season.

Happy Wedding

Sam and Melissa’s wedding was great yesterday. It was awesome to see so many people from school that I hadn’t seen in awhile and also to share with Sam and Mel on their day. Sam was in our wedding and he was nice enough to include me in his as an usher.

I met a couple of his friends I hadn’t met before as well as reacquainting myself with some that I had. The guys all had a lot of fun and got along great.

Jess and I realized that there really wasn’t any need for us to stay in Springfield. It was only an hour and a half drive (for some reason I was thinking it would be closer to two or two and a half hours there) and we easily could’ve driven back home after the rehearsal dinner on Friday and driven back up on Saturday for the ceremony. But it all worked out alright.

I think Sam and Mel had a good day and we may be meeting up with them for my birthday on Tuesday. Overall it was a great weekend.

Regeneration

I’ve been sick the past two days. I caught whatever illness plagued my dear wife Jessica over the weekend. It was unfortunate because I woke up Monday feeling so good. This morning I was able to get back to work but definitely did not feel awesome. I’d say that right now, at 7:09 PM I am at probably 85% on a wellness scale. Definitely recovering.

The second half of next week and first half of the following is going to be busy. First we’ll head off to Springfield, IL for our friends’ Sam and Melissa’s wedding. I am an usher and apparently that means I need to wear a tux (is that normal?). So a 2.5 hour drive and a stay in a hotel will be a mini-vacation before all of our favourite television shows come back on the following Monday while I am teaching a class (boo!). Tuesday the 22nd is my birthday (25 years!) and we’ll be going out to a fantastic dinner with friends at Dressel’s in St Louis that evening. Wednesday the 23rd Jessica is taking me out of work for a day in the city. I will probably be getting some new clothing for the winter and generally enjoying a day off with my wife.

Hopefully by then the air in Southern Illinois will have cooled down to a consistent mid-70s and it will actually feel like autumn the way it did a few weeks ago.

In two weeks’ time I should have one of my pending projects done (you can watch progress as it’s made here) and hopefully be working on a second one to be finished in October. Then it’s Jessica’s birthday, Halloween candy to pass out, and finally November shows up.

November means NaNoWriMo. And I am really excited about it this year. Mostly because I’ve had a whole year to loosely and mentally plan for it (as opposed to the -1 day I had last year when I first discovered it). I’ve got a sort-of plot ready and want to get it down on paper. You should totally do it too! If you sign up, let me know in the comments and we’ll all be writing buddies this November.

December means Christmas in California with my family and then in January we’ll be heading up to Portland with the fam for my little sister’s wedding. I guess it’s just busy all the way until 2010 comes around. Hopefully teaching this class will continue to be good as well.

How’s the end of your year shaping up?